“To me,” says Wright, who played Lou’s wife Eleanor, “Pride of the Yankees” was a love story. That bracelet was an example of their love. Just wearing it was special. I’ll never forget it.”

Gehrig’s wife had brought the bracelet onto the set so it could be used in the film. The bracelet, which Eleanor later presented to the Hall of Fame, is made up of 17 metal elements celebrating Gehrig’s mythical career, including seven World Championships and six All-Star Games.

The bracelet remains one of the Hall’s most valued treasures and is on tour in Chicago as part of the record-shattering “Baseball As America” exhibit. The Yankee first baseman gave the bracelet to his wife on their fourth anniversary.

“Mrs. Gehrig was so sweet and warm,” recalls Wright, 85. “I got to know her better through the years through her work with ALS. Her love for Lou endured. I think the film has endured because people love Lou Gehrig and they love a love story.”

Today, on the 100th anniversary of Gehrig’s birth, Wright will be at Yankee Stadium as part of a celebration presented by the ALS Association-Greater New York Chapter. There will be a pre-game wreath ceremony at Gehrig’s monument. Catfish Hunter’s wife Helen will be present as well as Ray Robinson, author of “Iron Horse,” and Dorine Gordon, president of the New York chapter of the ALS Association.

Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis is the insidious disease that took the lives of Gehrig and Hunter and is better known as Lou Gehrig’s Disease. Gehrig died on June 2, 1941, 17 days before his 38th birthday. The day he died, Joe DiMaggio was 19 games into his 56-game hitting streak, picking up two hits off of Bob Feller.

“Having Gehrig’s name associated with ALS does help our cause,” explains Gordon, citing the Lou Gehrig Challenge: the Campaign to Cure ALS (www.als-ny.org). “Putting a face to the disease helps raise awareness. It also serves as inspiration for people with ALS and their families because Lou Gehrig’s legacy is that of strength, courage and a positive attitude in the face of adversity.”

Tom Shieber, curator of new media at the Hall of Fame, has studied the bracelet and Gehrig and offers this insight.

The popular notion is the bracelet is made up of Gehrig’s World Series and All-Star rings, but Shieber believes it’s possible that jewelers Dieges & Clust, who created the jewelry for the World Series rings at the time, made the bracelet for Gehrig using molds of World Series and All-Star designs that were used in rings and pins.

As for the man himself, Shieber has no questions about why Gehrig, who was the first New York-born baseball hero, remains such a mythical figure.

“Not only was he a great ballplayer,” Shieber says, “but he was one of the first ballplayers that was super muscular. That was a new thing. Ruth was barrel-chested and had those great wrists, but Gehrig was so strong . . . he hit prodigious home runs.

“Part of his mystique also is that he played in the shadow of Ruth, the quiet hero,” Shieber adds. “He let his bat do his talking. He was this Iron Man, this Iron Horse, who was unstoppable, yet he succumbed to this terrible disease.”

Shieber also notes, “Gehrig didn’t have any children. In that way he was less tangible.”

With no descendants to color public opinion, the legend grew around this historic number: 2,130 consecutive games. Gehrig’s lifetime statistics also represent the sadness of unfulfilled milestones. The first baseman finished seven home runs below 500, 279 hits short of 3,000 and five RBIs shy of 2,000. On his headstone, his year of birth is wrong, listed as 1905.

A year after the luckiest man on the face of the earth died, “Pride of the Yankees” was made with Gary Cooper in the lead.

The movie was more than a baseball story. It was about love, pride, courage, family, and all things good.

Explains Teresa Wright in her still youthful voice: “Mr. [Samuel] Goldwyn loved the movie so much I remember him saying: ‘I don’t care if the picture makes a dime. I want every man, woman and child in America to see this movie.’ Obviously it made a lot of money.”

Lou Gehrig was America’s hero. So much so that during World War II, a Merchant Marine troop transport ship was named in his honor. The Liberty ship Lou Gehrig was commissioned in 1943. It carried 480 men and 120 vehicles and was involved in Operation Neptune one year later.